


If you will walk with me anywhere

by mywingsareonwheels



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Abduction, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood, Broken Bone, Ciri is a good influence, Disassociation, Fever, First In The Fandom, First Kiss, Fix-It, Forgiveness, Geralt is Trying, Getting Together, Head Injury, Hurt/Comfort, I just want to make sure that no one comes across a trigger unwarned, Implied future polyamoury, Insecurity, Jaskier | Dandelion Whump, M/M, Mental Illness, More comfort than hurt, PTSD, Post-Season/Series 01, Reconciliation, Self-Hatred, Soft Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Starvation, Trauma, Violence, Vomiting, Yennefer the reluctant medic, a great deal of softness, because honestly we cannot have too many right now, but no infectious diseases, concussion, even more music feelings, geralt gets his shit together, minor character deaths (implied), music feelings, self-neglect, this really is quite a lot softer than it sounds from these tags, threats of worse violence, yet another post-dragon hunt fix-it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:33:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23397064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mywingsareonwheels/pseuds/mywingsareonwheels
Summary: Nothing’s been the same since the Mountain.Well, one thing, perhaps. He still sings, writes, plays. Music still comes easily to him, as easy as breathing. More easily than the breaths he takes right now (draped and bound over a saddle, chest bouncing painfully against the stirrup leathers, worse when the horses break into a trot). If anything, he makes more music than he did, with a frantic urgency, filling the quiet land around him with the notes whirling in his head that are more necessary to him than food.Easier to come by, too, after a while.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 70
Kudos: 729
Collections: Interesting Character and/or Interesting Relationship Development





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Oh lovely _Witcher_ fans of AO3, I’m still not quite sure how this happened. I’ve read _The Last Wish_ , some time ago. Liked it. Not played the games. Not actually watched the tv series in full because I’m coping with life rather tenuously right now and can’t quite cope with anything too dark.
> 
> But tv-based Geraskier has utterly won my heart over the last few weeks. I’ve watched clips of their scenes on Youtube over and over again, cried and laughed over compilations and music fanvids. Fallen utterly in love with "The Amazing Devil", especially their latest album. I'm crushing outrageously on Joey Batey, and I've found my middle-aged, disabled trans masc heart consumed with affectionate envy for Henry Cavill’s ability to look Like That with long white hair and a black open shirt. And I've read episode summaries and pored over the game wiki in order to better comprehend a story that I’m still not yet ready to actually go looking for on Netflix. ;-)
> 
> And I've read so much fanfic. So fricking much fanfic because apparently you are all amazing writers in this fandom and I have been lapping it all up with such delight. <3 
> 
> And apparently despite, as I say, not actually having watched the thing yet, I now appear all the same to have been landed with a desperate desire to join those writing a post-Series 1 hurt/comfort/apology/reconciliation/getting-together fic. Because I don't think we can have too many, and I.... needed to write this one. So I have. And here it is. And I hope that at least some of you like it. :-)
> 
> I also hope I got the lore at least reasonably right! Please do gently prod me if there’s anything I can easily correct. :-)
> 
> The story is complete, in two chapters, and I hope to post chapter two tomorrow.
> 
> There is some violence and some mental illness in this fic; I think the content warnings in the tags are complete but do please ask if you'd like more info, or wish me to add another warning.

Even long afterwards, Jaskier is never quite sure who they were.

The blow on his head comes out of a pool of shadow in the alley behind the inn that he should have checked, would once have checked. He staggers back into grey, gathering shapes. The bonds are tight, the blindfold thick, and large enough to cover his nose as well as his eyes. It stinks of unwashed sweat and horseshit. He is grateful, in a vague way, that they do not gag him, merely threaten him with more pain if he speaks. At least this way he can still breathe. In. Out. He counts his breaths through the dizziness and the dull terror as they hustle him along the deserted streets and into what sounds and smells like a stableyard. Someone taught him to meditate once. Well, tried to, for one extremely frustrating afternoon. More like an hour.

Maybe twenty minutes.

Nothing’s been the same since the Mountain.

Well, one thing, perhaps. He still sings, writes, plays. Music still comes easily to him, as easy as breathing. More easily than the breaths he takes right now (draped and bound over a saddle, chest bouncing painfully against the stirrup leathers, worse when the horses break into a trot). If anything, he makes more music than he did, with a frantic urgency, filling the quiet land around him with the notes whirling in his head that are more necessary to him than food.

Easier to come by, too, after a while.

In the months (or is it a year? two?) since the dragon-hunt he’s hummed walking as his breeches grow baggier and his lute grows heavier. Sketched out more tunes and lyrics in his notebook with a shaking hand on waking, before sleeping, whenever he stops for a rest. Played and sang by a damp, sputtering fire most nights until his voice grows tired and raw.

But he doesn’t perform. The slightest hint of an audience beyond birds and trees and the occasional squirrel has him shrink into silence. He does odd jobs in stables and farms, occasionally scrapes up enough coin to visit an inn, and sits brooding in a corner, in unconscious imitation of someone he once knew. Making one cup of ale and one piece of bread last until long after night falls. That’s what he did tonight. He hid his lute (the case well-wrapped in oilcloths) in a thicket near the town, covered a once-gaudy doublet with an anonymous grey cloak, withdrew his face into the shadow of his hood. Came out again when he realised his money wouldn’t quite stretch to an unshared room. Started heading back to the woods to sleep, where it seems safer.

He never used to be shy of company.

Something shattered in him on the Mountain, and he still isn’t quite sure what it was. He was confident, once. Boisterous. He does remember. But perhaps what was broken was always concealing this… other self. Part of what he’s lost is the trick all performers need: the trick of believing they are someone worth noticing.

He wonders now when his captors noticed him, and what he is to them. A stranger in a small town, morose and distant and suspicious? Or a man who had a name once, and a face, and a somewhat mixed reputation, and an important…

… no, not _friend_. Must get the terms right, mustn’t presume. Just, someone he once knew.

Unhelpful thoughts. Better to give into the dizziness as his captors ride on, drifting off into an uneasy dream in which he cannot speak or sing, and his mouth is filled with blood. Perhaps it’s a memory. It is sharp and clear, and in it there are terse words in a low, soft voice and an awkward, gentle touch on his back.

He forces his way to something like consciousness as the company stops, as he is hauled off the horse and thrown on to a patch of grass and fallen leaves, left knee bruising itself against a tree root.

Tree root. Fallen leaves. An old, hard-learned habit comes back to him.

Leaf mould smell all round him, and the bark of the trunk, yes, by his cheek now, and his wrists are raw from the ropes but he clenches his hands in a pile of the dead leaves, all from last autumn presumably. He runs a delicate finger against the edge of one. Oak leaf, so, oak tree.

A chaotic choir of birdsong. Chiffchaff, wren, wood pigeon, thrushes, blackbirds, a solitary black woodpecker.

Dawn chorus then, in a forest or wood. Sunrise soon.

He must have drifted off. The kick that wakes him is vicious, aiming for his belly but missing. Possibly a cracked rib, he adds to his mental inventory. Rope burns, not dangerous but painful. Will get worse if there’s more of this. Chest badly bruised and cut about. A lot of superficial knocks and grazes. Head injury still affecting him, concussion, drew blood, needs cleaning to avoid infection.

He doesn’t get it. Just a few mouthfuls of tepid water, a lump of stale bread. Then his wrists are tied again, this time behind him, ankles still bound. He doesn’t try to fight them off. The threats are lurid, and each is followed by a chorus of laughter. They’re waiting for someone, the threats say, and he won’t long survive the arrival. And in the meantime, any lack of good behaviour will make things so, so much worse.

He’s picked out at least seven different human voices among his captors, at least eight horses. There might be more of both. He lets himself drift off again, tries to distance himself from the pain and the knowledge of what it all probably means.

_Been on borrowed time since the Mountain. I suppose this will be it then._

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

He might not sing around people any more, but his head is still awash with music. He’s lost the words for this one, somewhere. Can’t place them right now – something about a woman, about a kiss, and aren’t they all? – but the bittersweetness of the melody sends a dull ache to his battered chest.

It’s been four days, as far as he can tell, still by the same oak tree. His head aches and he has thrown up at least once. His captors have found the wait very dull, so they have been drinking. Continuously. He has more bruises now, and a whisper from one voice that left him shaking and cringing with a mouth full of leaves. He has not had as many meals as sunsets. It was a mild April a few days ago. Now it feels as though he is flickering between summer and winter, shivering and burning.

He holds the tune in his head, lets it play there and comfort him like a lullaby, over and over again. His diaphragm engages ( _ignore the pain from bruises and the cracked rib, it doesn’t matter now, won’t be long_ ), breath shapes itself around the phrases he is not singing, fingers instinctively twitch into rippling chords. He wonders if anyone will find his lute. He hopes someone does, some poor wandering musician in need of an instrument, and that they will treasure her as he once did. Maybe she’ll even get to dazzle an audience again one day.

His left hand reaches down an invisible fingerboard and finds a little patch of moss between tree roots. He strokes it, enchanted, mind full of its softness.

Everything is quiet and still, which is how he hears the harsh indrawn breath above him before a dead weight lands hard on his right ankle. There is a scream. Then shouts, the clash of metal, more screams, the sharp, acrid stench of blood. Someone grabs him by the collar of his doublet, there is another blow to his head. And that is all.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

_Jaskier? Jaskier! Hold on. Hold on for me._

Velvet on his cheek. Warm breath. A whinny. This horse… he knows this horse.

The blindfold is gone. There is light and colour. Green, so much green. That’s all. Something pale that might be a face, but he can’t be sure. The shapes have no meaning, no rhythm.

“Who… who…”

His voice is so weak, even he can’t hear it.

_Arms round my neck. Good. Well done._

He’s going mad. The horse… Horses don’t talk.

_That’s it. I’ve got you._

He’s astride the horse, before the man who has him. There is a strong arm around his waist. No ropes, but he doesn’t need them. This must be the one the others were waiting for. This must be the end.

_Not far to go now._

He whimpers.

There is a shaking breath behind him.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

His face is on a blanket of moss, and someone is stroking his hair. His head doesn’t hurt any more. Neither do his ribs. His eyes are wet.

_Sssshh. That’s it, Jaskier. You’re safe now._

A flask is pressed to his lips. Fresh water. Oh Gods, this is better than the finest wine, better than…

_Drink this. You need more sleep._

Another flask. Foul, bitter taste, but he drinks it down obediently.

_Good. Now more water._

He drinks again. Rough fingers run over his face, then tangle gently in his hair.

His face is on a blanket of moss, he is lying on moss, sinking softly into it.

“Valley of Plenty,” he murmurs.

_Sssshh. Rest._

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Morning light. It’s not moss beneath his cheek, it’s a pillow. There is clean linen everywhere. Sheets, pillowcase, a long nightshirt, bandages. It all smells of rosemary.

There are voices, in a different room. He hears snatches (the odd phrase, the odd bar).

… _absolutely typical… first time in months… nothing but..._

 _… can’t just… state he was in…_ _could have…_

 _… helping_ _because_ _… don’t want her to…_ _hope she..._

 _… back in…_ _Triss…_ _owe it to_ _…_

 _…_ _very… then… don’t expect..._

 _I_ _KNOW_ _!_

He pulls the sheets over his ears to shut out the noise. The arguing scrapes across his nerves like someone trying to bow a rebec with a carving knife.

The voices sound calmer when he lifts his head.

_… perhaps I’m… No one’s… like he… you and I..._

_Hmm._

_… hope he… truly._

_Thanks, Yen._

He falls asleep again.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Night. The shape of a candle is clear on a table beside the bed. The flame dances like a court lady, curtseying to a wind through the open window. No noise beside the wind and the minute hiss of melting wax.

There is a shape in the darkness. A figure.

“Jaskier. Are you awake?”

The figure draws nearer. Long white hair drawn back from a pale, chiselled face. Eyes like candle-flame. Jaskier tries to sit up, fails, shrinks back against the wall.

“Oh… no. No. Not funny.”

“No?”

“I don’t know who are, but... You’re not him.” He swallows. “You’re not the Witcher. You’re not Geralt of Rivia.”

The figure sits on the bed beside him. The candlelight is casting odd shadows on his face.

“No, he would never… He wouldn’t come for me. I… I granted his blessing.”

“Jaskier....”

“I took myself off his hands. I granted… I...”

“Oh, Gods, Jask. You... No.”

“I took myself off your hands, like you wanted. Like you wanted. Geralt!”

The name is a wail that breaks down into hard, choking sobs. He’s gasping. He can’t breathe. He can’t breathe.

Suddenly strong arms are around him, lifting him gently. The figure isn’t much taller than he is, but it cradles him like a child. A calloused right hand wields a scrap of silk, carefully wipes the mess of tears from his face.

“Breathe in, Jaskier. In for four, that’s right, just like I taught you. Now hold. Three, four. And out. Three Four. Hold. Yes. Yes, that’s good. Just breathe with me now.”

The mighty chest he rests against moves with each breath, stills with each hold, moving him, making a path for him to flow into.

It seems less dark now. He looks up at the resolute chin. At a new scar on the alabaster cheek. Eyes that won’t meet his.

Something twists in his gut.

“You don’t have to comfort me. You don’t have to pretend to...”

“I’m so sorry, Jaskier.”

“… what?”

“I... Fuck. I’m shit with words. But I… I said a lot of things when... when I saw you last. I was lost, and I hated myself and you were there with your damned cheerfulness and loyalty and courage and everything I didn’t deserve. So I took it all out on you because right then it was so much fucking easier than…”

Geralt swallows. Jaskier is weeping again.

“I went looking,” says Geralt. “To apologise. Tell you I’d made a mistake. Get my friend back. But I couldn’t find you. Then Cintra fell. There was… I found my Child Surprise. But I still asked in every inn and no one had heard you sing, anywhere. Gods, Jaskier. I thought you must be dead.”

“Not quite.” It’s barely a whisper.

“Nothing I said to you that day was true.”

“You… you didn’t mean…?”

“No.”

“Not… not shovelling shit?”

“Never.”

Jaskier’s limbs are weak and shaking, but he somehow he manages to reach up to Geralt’s face, trace the line of the scar, brush away the suspicious moisture there.

“Your hair needs a wash,” he says. His eyes flutter closed. Something like relief is spreading through him like warm poppy juice. “Is... forgive. ‘S okay.”

“Thank you.” Geralt’s voice is shaking. He lifts Jaskier again, lies him down on the bed, helps him take a few sips of water. “You’re exhausted, Jask. Sleep now.”

“Am… friend? Really?”

“Yes. Always. Sssh now.”

There is the warm press of lips on Jaskier’s forehead, and then he sleeps.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for your lovely comments and kudos on chapter 1! I'm feeling terribly warmly-welcomed. :D You all made me smile so much, and I will do my best to reply asap.
> 
> Here is chapter 2. There's a little angst in this one, but mostly a huge pile of softness. Because they deserve it, and so, especially in these horribly hard times, do we. <3

It was once a charcoal-burner’s hut, Geralt says. Long disused, now extended into a whitewashed, three-room cottage with stabling that Geralt has started using as a retreat, and as a home for Ciri when she isn’t studying with Triss or Yennefer, or accompanying him for short journeys in the autumn. There are wards of a frightening intensity around the house, and more surrounding the clearing a mile away in every direction. Jaskier feels a prickle of magic as Geralt carries him out of the door and into the garden, but it’s not unpleasant. Much like the feel of the warm May breeze against his still-feverish skin.

There is a vegetable patch, a little area of close-cropped grass, and then a riot of long grasses and wildflowers spreading out through the clearing and in among the birch trees of the encroaching woods. Roach is having a roll, but whickers at them as they pass. Jaskier has seen Geralt in places more radiantly idyllic, but never at peace.

Geralt puts Jaskier down in a cushion-laden basket chair, amid a small patch of buttercups. He pulls up a table with a simple meal laid on it, and gives Jaskier a stern look. And then he squats down by a vegetable bed, planting out some seedlings for some kind of brassica. Geralt is gardening. _Geralt_ _is gardening_.

“You know, I’m still not convinced you’re really Geralt of Rivia.”

Geralt stands up, brushes himself down. “Hmm.”

“Oh, that’s a relief. The gardening and the full sentences were making me nervous, but that’s a good classic witcher-grunt.”

It’s a shadow of his old teasing, and he knows it. But it’s… something. Anything to show Geralt that those words on the mountain haven’t broken him forever. Geralt carries enough guilt around with him already. And Jaskier has had enough of being a burden.

“Eat your stew, bard.”

He does. And he eats the fresh-baked bread that accompanies it, and sips some form of herbal tea sweetened with honey. It’s good. Then he falls asleep in the sunshine, and wakes at dusk, tucked into the bed with all the rosemary-scented linen, outer clothes folded neatly on a chair. On the window sill is a little vase of buttercups.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

He has a walking stick now. Geralt carved it from a birch sapling, and gave it a handle shaped like a perching lark, because apparently Geralt does things like this now. And for him.

He takes slow, steady walks around the garden. Lies back among the flowers and watches the clouds. Eats stews and lettuce and bread and cheese and last year’s apples. Drinks weak ale and herbal teas and well-water. Hums to himself, whenever Geralt isn’t there.

There are still monsters, so Geralt leaves sometimes, for a day or three, and comes back with a little more money, more food and other supplies, and occasionally the beginnings of a new scar. He does not say where he has been. But sometimes he lets Jaskier rub camomile oil into his back and shoulders.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

“You don’t sing any more.”

Jaskier is sitting at the table, chopping onions. He puts the knife down. “I sing.”

“Hmm.”

It’s a sceptical grunt, and Jaskier has never learned to resist those.

“I sing when I’m alone.”

Geralt sits beside him, takes the knife, starts chopping.

“I don’t perform any more, Geralt.” Shit. “I, um. I haven’t sung to others since we… Since the… It didn’t feel…”

“Oh all the fucking Gods!” Geralt suddenly stands and slams both hands down on the table, breathing heavily.

Jaskier cringes into his chair, wrapping his arms around himself. Geralt’s voice is low, harsh, dangerous.

“If anyone else had hurt you like I did, I would hunt them down like a basilisk and hang their guts on the nearest tree. _Fuck._ ”

“Geralt, please...”

“Show me your left hand.”

“Geralt?”

“Show me your left hand, bard. Please.”

Jaskier holds out his hand, shaking. But Geralt’s touch is gentle, even reverent. He strokes the roughened fingertips delicately with one thumb.

His voice is quiet now. “I scared you. I’m sorry. I’m not angry at you, Jaskier. Just at myself.”

Jaskier attempts a smile. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not. You need me to be calm, not…” Geralt exhales. “I will do better. Now. Where did you say you were when those bastards abducted you?”

* * * * * * * * * * *

The oil-cloths are muddy and torn, the case intact. The lute herself, out of tune, scuffed, but undamaged. Jaskier hugs her to his chest.

“How did you…?”

“You still have the calluses from playing her. You hid her well, by the way. Had to find her by scent.”

Jaskier nods, unable to speak. Geralt touches his shoulder.

“I’m going to set some traps. I’ll be out of earshot for at least an hour.”

He turns back at the door. “If you want to sing to me again one day, I...”

“Yes?”

Is that the flicker of a grin? “I promise not to throw bread at you.”

* * * * * * * * * * *

Yennefer visits, once, to check on her “patient”, and to needle Geralt until he storms off to go and meditate in the woods.

“You will go on very well now,” Yennefer says to Jaskier.

“Thank you.”

It is awkward. It is agonisingly awkward.

She finally meets his eyes just before she leaves.

“I’m still his destiny, you know. Every bit as much as his Child Surprise.”

“I know.” It’s the despair of years. Inescapable.

“Yes, well. Don’t get despondent. There are holes in destiny. Cracks where choice breaks in. I wouldn’t have chosen you myself, but we all know what his judgement’s like.”

They share a grin, which on reflection is somewhat terrifying.

And after she’s gone, he picks up his lute and carries on playing it until Geralt is nearly home.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

They sit in the garden. Ciri is making a daisy-chain, which she has threatened to put in Geralt’s hair. Roach and Jaskier are both proudly wearing theirs, and Jaskier also has a buttercup tucked behind one ear.

Jaskier wipes his sweating palms over his new breeches (fawn-coloured, soft, distressingly tasteful), then runs his fingers silently over the strings of his lute. He is ready, he can do this. He warmed up his voice while Ciri and Geralt went for a walk into the woods to pick some early blackberries. He hums one note to himself now, feeling the warm tone caress the air.

He looks up. Ciri is smiling at him. Geralt is worrying a dandelion stem between his fingers.

“This is, um. It’s a Redanian folk song. I, uh. I played with the timings a little. Yes. Right.”

He plays through the tune once, humming a counterpoint, and then begins to sing.

_Oh, madam, I will give to you the keys to Novigrad_

_And all the bells of Tridam will ring to make us glad_

_If you will be my joy, my sweetheart and my dear,_

_If you will walk with me anywhere._

_Oh, no, I'll not accept from you the keys to Novigrad_

_Though all the bells of Tridam should ring to make us glad_

_And I'll not be your joy, your sweetheart nor your dear,_

_And I'll not walk with you anywhere._

_Oh, madam, I will give to you a gallant silver chest,_

_With a key of golden silver and jewels of the best,_

_If you will be my joy, my sweetheart and my dear,_

_If you will walk with me anywhere._

_Oh, no, I'll not accept from you a gallant silver chest,_

_With a key of golden silver and jewels of the best,_

_And I'll not be your joy, your sweetheart nor your dear,_

_And I'll not walk with you anywhere._

_Oh, madam, I will give to you an embroidered silken gown,_

_With nine yards a-drooping and a-trailing on the ground,_

_If you will be my joy, my sweetheart and my dear,_

_If you will walk with me anywhere._

_Oh, no, I won't accept from you an embroidered silken gown,_

_With nine yards a-drooping and a-trailing on the ground,_

_And I'll not be your joy, your sweetheart nor your dear,_

_And I'll not walk with you anywhere._

_Oh, madam, I will give to you the keys to my heart,_

_And all the love that's in it and we nevermore shall part,_

_If you will be my joy, my sweetheart and my dear,_

_If you will walk with me anywhere._

_Oh, yes I will accept from you the keys to your heart_

_And all the love that's in it and we nevermore shall part,_

_And I will be your joy, your sweetheart and your dear,_

_And I will walk with you anywhere._

He finishes with a soft flourish of rippling chords, and then at last looks at his audience. Ciri applauds vigorously. Geralt casts him a look he cannot decipher, but the “hmm” is at least vaguely approving. Roach says nothing, but bites into a clump of daisies, the critic.

Jaskier gives his lute a nervous (and unnecessary) tune, and then launches into a long ballad about a maiden who dresses as a man to follow her love to sea, saves him from a shipwreck, and weds him on the back of a whale that swims them to shore. Ciri finishes Geralt’s daisy chain and plonks it unceremoniously on his head. He grunts, but doesn’t attempt to remove it.

More songs follow. Old songs, songs Jaskier learned when he was a boy, and then on the road from other bards. One or two have mildly saucy lyrics that have Ciri giggling and Geralt hiding a smirk. And then he sings a simple song of heartbreak that he wrote on the road months ago, which is vague enough that he can sing it with a clear voice, looking up at the sky, pretending that the “you” of the song is not sitting right there.

“Dear audience,” he says at last. “I fear your bard’s voice is tired, and this is usually the point when I ask for a cup of fine wine and a bowl of whatever is on offer. Unless of course there are any requests.” He grins a little, expecting nothing but perhaps an amused snort from Geralt.

“I have one,” says Geralt.

“You… you do?”

“Yeah. Can’t quite remember the title but it starts, um. What was it? ‘When a handsome bard/Graced a ride along...’ Hmm. Something like that.”

For a moment, Jaskier gapes at him. There are a rush of thoughts to be had about this development, but foremost is the realisation that he has never heard Geralt sing before. It’s a decent voice, low, and surprisingly sweet. The tune is wrong, but it sounds more like rough harmony than complete discordance. It’s the singing of a man who’s never fit his ears and mind around the shape of a melody, but who still on some level resonates with music. _I could teach him_ , thinks Jaskier, wildly. _Our voices would blend. We could sing duets._

“Um, yes,” he says after a moment. “Yes. I think I can… I think I can sing that one. It’s, um. It’s ‘humble bard’ actually.”

“Hmm.”

He begins nervously, hands suddenly sweating on the strings, but his voice and his muscles remember what this feels like, this song that made them both famous. And glory of glories, as he launches into the chorus he hears the other two join in, both word-perfect.

_Toss a coin to your Witcher,_

_O Valley of Plenty, O Valley of Plenty_

_Toss a coin to your Witcher and friend of humanity!_

Ciri has a pretty piping soprano, impressively confident in her upper register. A good natural ear, worth training.

And he was right. Geralt can’t carry a tune, but their voices do blend beautifully.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

“I wish I could join you,” he says, as he helps Geralt finish packing, and then wishes he hadn’t. _Presumptuous_ , he reproves himself. _He’s been so kind,_ _so patient,_ _but_ _he has a better travel companion now._

“Yes,” says Geralt. “You should. Next year. When you’re well enough.”

“Oh. Um, good. Good, yes I’d… I’d like that.”

They work in silence. Jaskier somehow still remembers the arrangement of potions in the right pockets of Roach’s saddlebags. He pulls a drawstring tight, then starts on the next.

“We’ll be back by Saovine.”

“Are you… are you going to Kaer Morhen for the winter?”

Geralt stares at him. “No. Here.”

“Would you, um… How long can I…?” Jaskier bites his lip. “I mean, I was planning to stay and tend the garden and finish the harvest and things. Might I winter here too? If, um… You see, I haven’t really anywhere to…”

Geralt is still staring at him. "This is your home.”

Jaskier turns away. There’s suddenly a lump in his throat, tears pricking his eyes. He feels a warm hand on his back, resting between his shoulder-blades.

“Fuck, Jaskier. I thought you knew.”

“No, I… Sorry, I...”

And then there are those strong arms wrapping around him from behind, pulling him close. A stubbled chin rests on his shoulder. Long silver hair tickles his neck. “I’m sorry. I should... I should be clearer with you. This is your home, Jaskier, as long as you want it. With us. With me.”

Jaskier nuzzles against him, wondering when Geralt learned to speak so much, and leave him tongue-tied.

“You should roam when you’re well enough. You’re a bard. You need to sing for more than just squirrels and a pair of reprobates like Ciri and me. Or Roach. You need a life that isn’t just me. But you… You can come back here. Always. Spend the winters with us. Join me on the Path as and when you wish.”

Jaskier pulls away, paces, turns back. It sounds good. Oh Gods, it sounds glorious, but...

“That’s the trouble, though, isn’t it? I will be well enough, thanks to you and Yennefer. And you know what that means.”

“Hmm?”

He laughs, and can’t quite keep the bitterness out. “I’ll talk too much. I’ll… I’ll sing, all the time. I’ll speak my mind when I shouldn’t, and, and fill silences because they make me nervous. I’ll be just as incompetent and annoying as you always found me, only now I get nightmares too and I’ll wake you screaming when you’ve finally got to sleep.” He shakes himself, fighting off tears. “I’ll be too loud, too much,” he breathes. “I’ll be too… me. And I don’t want to do that to you. Not any more.”

“No….” Geralt starts forward as though to grab him, then stops, exhales. “Jaskier,” he says quietly. “You don’t… You were never too much. Never too you. Fuck. I was… I just… I wasn’t… I needed to grow to match you. That’s all.”

“Oh...”

“And yes, you talk too much, but I missed it so fucking much when... And when you’re silent it’s…” He pulls a face. “I prefer the talking.”

“Geralt.”

“So, yeah. Stop worrying, bard.”

“Okay. I… I will still try not to rabbit on at you when you’re doing important witchery things. Or, you know. At least stop the second or third time you ask me to be quiet.”

Geralt actually laughs at that.

“And… and Yennefer?”

It takes Geralt a moment to reply. “She’ll always be part of my life. But I want you in it too. My choice, my companion. If… if that is what pleases you.”

Slowly, Jaskier walks back towards him. He places one hand on Geralt’s chest, feeling the slow heartbeat through the linen shirt. His own heart seems to be dancing a tarantella. “Does it please you, Geralt? Do _I_ please you?”

“Yes. Took me long enough to fucking get that, but yes, Jaskier. You please me.”

“Well, then. This is what pleases me, Geralt. You are what pleases me.”

Jaskier gazes into those firelight eyes for a moment, and then Geralt is kissing him. It’s chaste, and soft, and somehow carries an intriguing promise that one day both chastity and softness might be gloriously discarded.

* * * * * * * * *

Geralt and Ciri depart while the early September sun has still not burned away the morning mist. Ciri hugs Jaskier tight, and solemnly nods when he tells her to make notes of all the monsters they encounter, “since that great oaf is always so stingy with the details”. They wish each other sweet dreams. They mean it. They need it.

But Geralt takes his hand, and presses it silently, and kisses it for all the world like a knight errant honouring his lady-love.

“Until Saovine, bard.”

“Until Saovine, Witcher.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

They never learn who abducted Jaskier, why they took him, or who the fearsome leader was that the gang were waiting for in the oakwood. Geralt goes on a hunt for answers, but the trail is cold. Not Nilfgaardians, he is sure, and not mere bandits. Beyond that? Well. Whatever their plan was, it failed, and that is good enough for now.

That winter Geralt starts learning to sing, and Ciri starts learning the lute and the tabor, and there are duets and trios echoing around the old charcoal-burner’s cottage, and disturbing Roach who is trying to get some peace and quiet, thank-you-so-very-much. Ciri recounts the autumn’s adventures, and Jaskier writes five new songs, and promises to sing them all in the finest taverns come the spring.

He writes a sixth, a version of “The Keys of Novograd” about a witcher who finds a crack in destiny for choice to break in, and gives a human bard the keys to his oddly-beating heart, that they might walk together anywhere. He isn’t sure if he will ever sing that one to anyone, but he thinks he might. He has started to believe again that he is someone worth noticing.

And if in the dark hours he and Geralt learn some more lessons about what pleases them both, then there is no witness but the lute, and she keeps all her master’s secrets until he chooses to sing them himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fellow fans of English folk music may recognise "The Keys of Novograd" as a thinly-veiled adaptation of the gorgeous song "The Keys of Canterbury". I'm particularly partial to this verson of it by the band Show of Hands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwTRcC5CfA0. And here is some sheet music and more detailed lyrics: http://folksongcollector.com/keys.html.
> 
> Please do come and say hello on tumblr! I am here: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/mywingsareonwheels. (I'm also on Twitter, as @mywingsonwheels, but I'm around quite a bit less on that.) I mostly post and reblog about fandom things (lots of _Good Omens_ and increasingly also _The Witcher_ , plus Shakespeare, Tolkien, Jane Austen, etc. etc.), but also some political stuff, disability stuff, trans stuff, cat pictures etc.. :D


End file.
